Link: https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2022-05/cp220086en.pdf

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General Court of the European Union

PRESS RELEASE No 86/22

Luxembourg, 18 May 2022

Judgment in Case T-609/19

Canon v Commission

The General Court dismisses the action brought by Canon, which was fined € 28 million by the Commission for failure to comply with merger control rules in its acquisition of Toshiba Medical Systems Corporation

In 2016, Canon Inc (‘the applicant’), a Japanese multinational company specialising in the manufacture of optical and image processing products, took over Toshiba Medical Systems Corporation (TMSC), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Toshiba Corporation (‘Toshiba’).

That acquisition was carried out in two steps, through a securitisation vehicle (MS Holding) created specifically for that purpose. In the first step, on 17 March 2016, MS Holding acquired certain voting shares in TMSC for approximately € 800, while the applicant, in consideration for payment of the full price agreed for the purchase of TMSC (approximately € 5.28 billion), acquired call options on all the remaining voting shares in TMSC. In addition, the applicant acquired the one non-voting share in TMSC for approximately € 40 (‘the interim transaction’).

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